Every Friday, Lada leaves her small apartment to take tourists around Prague’s underworld.
“I pass on my cautionary tale,” says the 54-year-old sex worker as she chain-smokes her way through Wenceslas Square in the Czech capital.
“At least my ruined life can be useful. I can make a clean breast of it. It’s a relief.”
Lada, who was homeless for years, is one of six tour guides who work for a social enterprise called Pragulic that tackles “myth and prejudice” around people who live on the streets of Prague.
The city was infamous for its criminal underworld and drug problem in the 1990s. It still has a substantial homeless population of around 4,000, according to its social services.